Most fruit trees are apples and pears, and deer love them. You will also often find fruit trees growing in grazing ground. They might be at the edge of a former garden, around an old barn or situated in what was once a pasture. Most anywhere you hunt, there will be some muscadines, and in seasons when they bear fruit, they make for some fine hunting opportunities.įarming, at least the kind that involves one family working the good earth for a living, seems increasingly to belong to a world we have lost.Īs a result, there are abandoned farms with fruit trees scattered here and there on the property. During the season, he gives the tree a good shake every day or two to bring ripe fruit to the ground.įox grapes are most prevalent in the upper piedmont and mountain regions their favorite growing places are along little branches running through pastures or on the banks of small creeks where the overhead canopy isn’t particularly dense. He has a good-sized persimmon tree in a food plot 150 yards or so behind his house. When it comes to persimmons, one anecdote from Edgefield’s Gene Smith might be worth sharing as some index to the degree that deer love them. Learn to pick out their distinctive shape and exceptionally shiny leaves, and then try to figure out a good stand placement nearby. Moreover, they start bearing fruit when quite young - it isn’t unusual to see a tree only a few feet tall laden with persimmons - and they are among the most predictable of all trees when it comes to bearing fruit annually. They favor fence rows, field edges, and other relatively open ground, and they are often among the first to sprout when a pasture is left to revert to a natural state or when cleared land grows up. Persimmons can be found most anywhere in South Carolina. ![]() Rest assured, deer will know when they are ready to eat, and if the fruit is falling, chances are that it is ripe. It’s just that the two events often coincide. ![]() Second, contrary to popular folklore and generations of country cousins enjoying the misery of their city-slicker relatives when they bit into an unripe persimmon, you do not have to have a heavy frost for persimmons to ripen. The single most important type of soft mast, thanks to being widespread, predictable in bearing year-in and year-out, and holding fruit over a lengthy period of time, is the persimmon.īefore going into detail about how to incorporate persimmons into your hunting strategy, a mention of two misconceptions or misunderstandings is merited.įirst, the persimmon is one of a relatively few tree species that comes in male and female varieties. Secret, common sense, or hunter smarts, the bottom line is that the savvy hunter will use soft mast to his advantage. It really isn’t a “secret,” but given the fact that archers consistently fail to take full advantage of the golden opportunities offered by these delicacies from nature’s rich larder, you would think such was the case. With that thought in mind, what follows is a detailed look at the predominant types of soft mast and some suggestions on how to utilize them in your hunting. ![]() Their thoughts are considerations that every serious bow hunter needs to keep firmly in mind, especially given the fact that, by happy coincidence, the peak of soft-mast availability in South Carolina coincides almost exactly with the advent of archery season. ![]() I’ll take a persimmon tree over most anything, and when there is soft mast available, the smart hunter will always take advantage of it. “For years, we had a huge persimmon tree on the family farm,” he said, “and every year, you could count on two things: that big old persimmon would be weighted down with fruit, and deer would clean up the fruit as soon as it hit the ground. Just give me a stand near a patch of pawpaws or a heavily laden persimmon tree, or put me near some muscadines or a tree dropping apples, and I know there will be deer aplenty around.”įort Lawn’s Roy Turner echoes similar thoughts. “When there’s a good soft- mast source available,” he said, “I’ll leave the acorns and browse to someone else. As a man who has hunted whitetails with a bow all over the country and taken more than his fair share of trophies, Davis is a great fan of soft mast. Davis, a skilled, seasoned bowhunter who grew up in Greenwood and still calls South Carolina home. Deer have a sweet tooth that will rival that of any overly energetic, greedy-gut adolescent, and when and where available, they will feast on soft mast in preference to anything else. While hunters tend to talk about the acorn crop or how food plots are faring, deer enthusiasts in general - and bow hunters in particular - need to be keenly aware of the food factor sometimes referred to as “soft mast.”Īnother description for this collection of important food sources is “deer candy,” and that expression goes right to the heart of the matter.
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